Tracy Arthur Kachadourian | Photograph by Adam Williams
Overview: Tracy Arthur Kachadourian is a professional mediator and an expert in facilitating conflict resolution. She and Adam talk about how to build more empathetic, accountable and resilient relationships, personal and professional. Among other things.
Tracy grew up in a home where conflict and her mother’s mental health challenges led Tracy to live in and out of foster homes for years and, ultimately, fight for emancipation from her mother as a young teen. Tracy talks with Adam about those difficult early experiences and how they influence her as the conflict resolution facilitator and mediator that she is today.
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SHOW NOTES, LINKS, CREDITS & TRANSCRIPT
The We Are Chaffee podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health.
Along with being distributed on podcast listening platforms (e.g. Spotify, Apple), We Are Chaffee is broadcast weekly at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays, on KHEN 106.9 community radio FM in Salida, Colo.
Tracy Arthur Kachadourian
Website: arthurmediation.com
Facebook: facebook.com/arthurmediationservices
Mediation Association of Colorado: coloradomediation.org/mediator/arthur-mediation-services-llc
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/arthurmediationservices
YouTube: youtube.com/channel/UCDyp-y1iPfJCVqLkHnlMX7g
We Are Chaffee Podcast
Website: wearechaffeepod.com
Instagram: instagram.com/wearechaffeepod
CREDITS
We Are Chaffee Host, Producer & Photographer: Adam Williams Williams
We Are Chaffee Engineer: Jon Pray
We Are Chaffee Community Advocacy Coordinator: Lisa Martin
Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment: Andrea Carlstrom
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Transcripts are produced using an automated transcription app. Although it is largely accurate, minor errors inevitably exist.
[Intro music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams [00:00:15]: Welcome to the We Are Chaffee Podcast where we connect through conversations of community, humanness and well being. In Chaffee County, Colorado, I’m Adam Williams Williams. Today I am talking with Tracy Arthur Kachadourian of Arthur Mediation Services.
Tracy is an expert in conflict resolution. So of course we talk about that today. It seems like a good time to do that for all of us. Conflict resolution skills are applicable everywhere in our lives. That’s in personal and professional relationships and I think to just be part of a society that sure seems like it’s hurting and it could use some mending and maybe some helpful thoughts on how to get there.
Tracy grew up in extraordinary circumstances. There were conflicts, there were mental health challenges in the home. She moved in and out of foster care for some years. Ultimately, she fought for and received emancipation in court as a young teenager in order to be allowed to live permanently at a children’s home in another state until she came of age.
I cannot imagine having the courage and clarity of mind at that young age to be able to do such a thing. We talk about the harsh difficulties of that experience for Tracy and then how she embraced what she saw as stability provided by the children’s home and opportunity. She would thrive there. She would graduate high school, she would go into college and then further to earn multiple advanced degrees. She would become an ambassador of sorts and an international facilitator working with that children’s home. She now works as a mediator in a range of areas including family mediation and elder care and in real estate, HOA and property management disputes. And that’s just a partial list.
We talked today about the skills that we all need for good relationships and for resolving conflicts in the workplace and at home or with anyone anywhere, among other things. For all things We Are Chaffee podcast, go to wearechaffeepod.com. You can see episode show notes with photos, links and a transcript of this conversation. You can subscribe to the monthly email newsletter there as well. And if you are on Instagram, you can see more photos and connect with the podcast @WeAreChaffeePod.
Now here we go with Tracy Arthur Kachadourian.
[Transition music, guitar instrumental]
[00:02:28] Adam Williams: You’re a mediator, a conflict resolution expert, a peacemaker, and I’m feeling like this might be a pretty good time to be in that business. Or is that just me?
[00:02:39] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: No, it’s a pretty good time to be in this business. Absolutely. Unfortunately. Right?
[00:02:44] Adam Williams: Yeah. It depends on perspective, doesn’t it?
[00:02:46] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right.
[00:02:47] Adam Williams: Are you seeing more demand for your skills, let’s say, in the last 10 years or however long you’ve been doing this work than what you used to?
[00:02:57] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Yes, I’ve absolutely have noticed an increase in utilizing the different types of conflict resolution.
[00:03:07] Adam Williams: Is that in any particular area? I know that real estate, for example, is one of the areas that you do, but there are several. And maybe we’ll get into some of those later and actually list those out. But I wonder if there’s anything in particular you’re seeing that is calling for you more and more and more.
[00:03:23] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Definitely. So I started out as a facilitator, basically facilitating conversations to help companies or educational institutions come to certain agreements. And then from that I moved into mediation. And for example, in 2015, I read a Forbes magazine article, Top 25 Jobs by 2025. We’re in 24 right now. And you can imagine that mediation was at the top of the list.
[00:03:56] Adam Williams: Yeah, we’re recording this as we basically roll into 2025. So you are right on. You know, at the doorstep of this moment, you mentioned facilitation, you mentioned mediation.
I think there are some terms that come to my mind that kind of feel like there’s at least overlap. I mentioned conflict resolution, mediation. If we throw in the word arbitration reconciliation, like there’s all these things. Right. Can you in maybe a brief way educate us on what are the distinctions to the extent that there even are, I don’t know where they’re the same and where they might be just overlapping all those terms.
[00:04:32] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. So think of it like an umbrella. So you have the top of the umbrella and that’s overall conflict resolution. And under that umbrella you have different methods of how to resolve conflicts. Those ways are arbitration, mediation, facilitation, things like that. So mediation is where a third party neutral helps two different parties come to an agreement. But we do not, we are not a judge or jury, we do not offer legal advice. We basically facilitate the conversation and assist the parties to come to a resolution.
A facilitator may, for example, facilitate a conversation for a business to help them come to an agreement about how to streamline a process, for example.
[00:05:30] Adam Williams: So there are a number of ways this gets used. You know, I feel like what we have here are a couple of parallel ideas that are related. On one hand, we have you as a professional, as an expert in all these different lanes.
Then we also have what I probably tend to think more of on a personal, daily, one to one relationship kind of thing. That might be with my wife, it might be with my kids and family dynamics. It might be how we interact with people in our workplaces or just anybody. Right? Conflict resolution in that sense of how do we resolve our disagreements with people? And so I’m curious, what led you to this work with this in mind, that I’d like us all as listeners to be able to think about how do we apply this in our personal lives more broadly than just when they might need you to come in and help facilitate between businesses or mediate some official issues.
[00:06:29] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So the question is, how did I?
[00:06:31] Adam Williams: What led you to your interest in this? And just recognizing that this is something I have as a skill, this is something I have as not just a fortuitous Forbes magazine, you know, career choice, but what about you leads you to this career in life if I can help people resolve problems, right?
[00:06:55] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So basically, although I had a very happy childhood, it did involve a lot of conflict. And as I grew up and through my teen years and college and university, I took personality tests that they have you take, you know, in high school to see what you might want to be when you grow up and graduate. And they do the same thing in university and grad school. And the theme that was always consistent in those was that I was a peacemaker. I’m a visionary educator.
I like to resolve conflict. You know, so that kept coming up as part of my personality traits, which led to, you should be an attorney, you should be an educator, you should maybe look into being an entrepreneur, and all of these things kind of evolved. And so as I gained one skill, I gained another skill in the area of conflict resolution.
[00:08:05] Adam Williams: You say attorney. A lot of people would think that’s not exactly a peacemaker. That’s somebody who’s stirring up some things, right? Because there can be conflict between the attorneys. But I say that in jest. I get what you’re saying. I wonder about sometimes what it is that helps shape us, who we are, shape our lives. That’s a big overarching thread through this podcast series of a few years now. And when you say that there was conflict in the home, we tend to either model that, right?
We take that baggage into our own lives, and we create a lot of conflict and drama for ourselves. Or a lot of times what we do is we learn from that and say, I don’t want to be that. Maybe for somebody who has had an alcoholic parent who acted in a certain way, you’re like, you know what? I’m not gonna drink. Things like that. And so it sounds like you had a little bit of conflict there that you took in. You said, I don’t wanna be that I’m gonna be the one who makes things better for people. And I’m curious about how early maybe that started. You’ve really carried that through to help people maybe have something better than what you felt like you were getting as a child.
[00:09:08] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Definitely. I think the first part of my life, I was born and raised here in Salida, Colorado. And I don’t mind at all explaining my childhood and how I grew up. As you can imagine, we are surrounded by mountains, and how we enjoy where we live stems from how we grow up, who our parents are, how they raise us, are they healthy mentally, you know, et cetera. Well, unfortunately, although I had beautiful friends and relationships here growing up, unfortunately my mom had a lot of problems.
So as you can imagine, I grew up in and out of foster care because my mom was unable to consistently provide for us. Now, when you’re young, you’re five, six, seven, eight, you know, pretty much till you’re in middle school, it really kind of rolls off, right? So I had a wonderful time in foster care. I know where every home is and still is. I have fond memories of all my foster care families. I had a great time. but in that was conflict. The conflict of going back home and having to readjust right to family life. And what is it like living with my mom now that she’s out of the mental hospital? Right. And walking on eggshells until it becomes normalized again because you just came from one setting to a different setting. And how that is traumatic and how we deal with that and what, what emotions arise out of that. And as a kid, how you deal with those emotions can cause conflict as well.
[00:11:05] Adam Williams: It would be difficult to not know which you is acceptable in which place. Right. Like you’re always shifting. I’m sure that you figured out, oh, well, I have to act this way with this person and this way with that person, because we all do that anyway throughout life, you know, whoever, we can adjust to their behavior. I describe myself sometimes as a people pleaser because I learned to walk on eggshells. I learned to be perceptive to those emotions, the criticisms, the whatever. So that I’m like, well, how can I smooth that out? How can I preempt and not have that person get mad at me or whatever?
I think that that people pleasing thing has kind of led to, in a way, let myself go deep into life here as, you know, adulthood, trying to always adjust to that other person instead of figure out, well, who am I supposed to be? Where’s the boundary that I get to be me and expect that person to meet Me in the middle. That’s a very difficult thing to do. And you were having to bounce back and forth, it sounds like. But ultimately what you did clearly here is take away these strengths, these opportunities to be helpful to other people. And like you mentioned education and all these things, you’ve made a career in life of this. That is opportunity, I think, rather than getting bogged down in what that early experience was.
[00:12:22] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. And so, you know, there came a time where my mom couldn’t take care of us anymore. So a little long winded, to answer your question, delves a little more into my youth about transitioning from Salida to Texas. So we talked about the beautiful scenery, how I grew up with all the kids from kindergarten. So even though there was conflict in my family life, I had wonderful friends and their parents who always seemed to help in one way or another, as well as the foster families. But then there came a period where my mom, my mom’s brother and my grandpa said, you can’t take care of them by yourself anymore. We’re going to move you to Texas. Well, when you grow up with the same people and then you move to Lubbock, Texas, where it’s flat, smelly, and you know anyone–
[00:13:20] Adam Williams: It does smell a lot like cattle there, stockyards and stuff.
[00:13:26] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right, right, right. So as a kid, you’re being ripped from what you know, even though it might be less than normal. Now you’re moving a child or children into a situation that they’re unfamiliar with. New school, new home. Right. Et cetera. So all that causes emotions. So we react to what emotions we’re feeling. So, of course I started to rebel and, you know, I started hanging out with the wrong crowd, so to speak. And that led me to having more conflict with my mom. My brothers left, they were older, they left and I was left at home. And so I was feeling abandoned by my brothers. I was feeling like everything. I was swimming upstream, swimming against the tide.
[00:14:22] Adam Williams: Yeah.
[00:14:22] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: And I couldn’t figure out a way to get out until I got put on probation.
And my brother would come back because he lived at a children’s home at this point. And he came back home to visit only twice. And he told me about this children’s home. And I said, wow, that sounds like it would be a great place to live. So as the youngest child and the only girl, of course I’m thinking of my older brother, like, wow, I would like to try that. But I couldn’t just go live there. Well, now I’m on probation. I live at home, which is not a great place to be. I go to court to become a ward of the state and renounce my mom as my parental authority so that I could go live at Buckner Children’s Home.
[00:15:17] Adam Williams: Is that emancipation? Yes, because I’ve. I’ve seen the occasional high profile, probably case of some celebrity kid or somebody, right. Who has sought emancipation for whatever their reasons are. But that is not something that I’ve known a lot about from hearing you describe this. That’s got to be incredibly difficult emotionally, I’m sure, you know, legally and all the things, like, there’s a lot that you’re going through there. So that takes a lot of courage. What I’m hearing, too, because I love this thread through the podcast, is resilience. There’s so much strength that people have, and this is what I find so amazing as I sit and have these conversations with people, is the resilience and the strength that people have to take these circumstances, they overcome them, they go on to all these things. You went to this children’s home? Well, first, can you describe for me what that really means? Because I’m not sure what picture to have in my head around this.
And I’d like, you know, let’s help listeners, too. Like, what does that really mean?
[00:16:18] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So it’s changed a lot, however, at the time, kids went to children’s homes because they were orphaned, because they became a ward of the state. They were in foster care.
And this was a place that kids could go live while their parents or their caregivers could correct whatever it was that removed those children so that they could go back and live with them.
[00:16:47] Adam Williams: How is that different than a foster care situation?
[00:16:51] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So a children’s home meant you lived there for.
At the time. I’m speaking at the time, not basically because things have changed today, right, in the last 10, 15 years, dramatically in regard to how I grew up. So at the time, foster care was a temporary place where kids went.
They lived with a family, a single parent, whatever, until, for example, my mom, let’s say, let’s just keep it in my wheelhouse. My mom would go into the mental hospital, so they would have to get her on medication to get her moods back appropriately, et cetera. And sometimes that would take three months, sometimes six months, sometimes a year. And so then at that point, then I would go back to live with her, and then the cycle would start all over. A children’s home is more permanent in most cases. So I lived there. Actually, I lived in a shelter first, and then I went to the children’s home. But once I was at the children’s home, I lived there from 15 until 18.
[00:18:04] Adam Williams: Are we saying someone’s house, it’s just a permanent situation, or are we saying there’s maybe more kids than that and more staff and things like that? Yes.
[00:18:13] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So this children’s home had six homes, and they were age appropriate. So there was a preschool home, there was elementary homes. Right. And in each home, 12 kids lived in each home. One side of the home was two bedrooms where three girls lived in each room, and on the other side of the house was three boys and three boys. Right. Four bedrooms total. Twelve kids total. And two house parents who were married. Okay. And they ran the house like a home would be run, like a family.
[00:18:55] Adam Williams: Gave you structure that probably a lot of these kids, maybe all of these kids, they’re there because they did not have such structure. And those positives.
[00:19:04] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly. And most kids don’t have a choice. They are placed there by the foster care system or by the state. Whereas in my case, I wanted to live there. And that, I think, was a big difference in that I fought to live there. And that might be hard for some people to hear, but I knew that that was my chance out. I had friends that I wanted to one day be like their parents or have the life that they had, whatever that meant. And I saw this as an opportunity.
Not that I hated my mom, because I didn’t. I loved her, but I knew at a young age she couldn’t take care of me. So how could I get out of that? I didn’t manipulate anyone. I didn’t, you know, make up any stories. I said, I want to do this because I need a better life. And I think this is how I can get it.
[00:20:05] Adam Williams: This sounds to me like extraordinary courage at that age in fortitude. And this just. This will to say, I know that I can have better. I know that I deserve better, and I’m going to use this path to create better, to create this opportunity. I don’t think that I, at 15 years old, would have been like, hey, let me. Let me see what I can work with here. Especially using the legal and court system as a means to do that. I would have probably been hanging out with the kids that are getting into trouble. I would have been acting out, saying, I don’t care to do right. I want attention. I’m gonna go get in trouble to get that attention. Well, now I’m a bad kid. I’m just gonna keep spiraling down.
[00:20:47] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. And so I did have a little bit of that I did rebel in the beginning. I did start smoking and, you know, doing things with my friends, like skipping school. But over time, I also had positive friends. And remembering back on my childhood with my friends here in Salida and how somehow it didn’t connect. Somehow I knew that there was something better. And how do I get that? Because what I was experiencing at home and knowing that skipping school leads to expulsion, which leads to getting on probation, which leads to, I don’t want to go down that road, and I don’t want to be. Be like my mom. When I’m an adult, I want the exact opposite, which is where we started off at. I want to be a productive citizen. Did I know the word productive citizen when I was that age? No. But I knew I wanted to be better. I did not want to get pregnant out of wedlock.
I didn’t want to become a statistic. I didn’t want to become, you know, an addict in some way. I didn’t want to be like my mom at all. So what is mine? What does that mean? Well, who is my mom? What is she dealing with? So that all evolved over time and understanding. My mom is a person and a human, and she went through so many things. But that reality of things thinking didn’t really hit me until I went to college and studied psychology.
[00:22:31] Adam Williams: The fact that you even went to college, like you said, you could have skipped school and gone the other direction.
[00:22:35] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right.
[00:22:35] Adam Williams: But instead what you said was, I’m going to plant a flag right now and move forward. You went to college. You have two master’s degrees as well, is that right?
[00:22:42] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Yes.
[00:22:43] Adam Williams: So you clearly went so far in the positive direction from this. Again, I think that’s an amazing foundation for this story and what it is we’re talking about with conflict resolution.
[00:22:54] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Well, there were many opportunities granted to me, and so my motto at a young age became, let’s take advantage of opportunities, but don’t take advantage of people.
So I took advantage of the opportunity of moving to the children’s home, asking the judge, hey, because. Because my mom sat right there in court. They didn’t remove me like they do sometimes now. Right. Because it’s traumatic for a child to say, to renounce their parental figure right in front of their face, right in front of them, right in front of her face. And that’s harsh, but I’m explaining to the judge, and I still see it in my mind’s eye. Lubbock, Texas, County Courthouse, standing in front of the judge, and he specifically asked me, why do you want to live in a children’s home instead of with your mom. Can you explain to me so that I can make a better decision? And at the age of 14, I had to do that. It was difficult, you know, but again, I had to move forward. Like you said, this is my way out.
[00:24:05] Adam Williams: Are you familiar with the wounded healer archetype of the psychologist Carl Jung?
[00:24:10] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: I’m familiar with Carl Jung, of course.
[00:24:13] Adam Williams: Okay, so wounded healer archetype. This is a perfect example of this. You had this conflict, this trauma, all these struggles, and you then became a healer yourself. And that’s the direction we’re working in this conversation now. I appreciate your sharing so much of this foundational background that what you’ve done is take this and say, I’m going to make it something positive, and I’m going to make it so other people don’t. Don’t have to go through the conflict that I have experienced. What I’m going to do is help be a healer and this positive force using my empathy because of those experiences.
So that’s where we’re headed here, is that you then become this conflict resolution expert again. I understand that’s the umbrella for so many things that you do. But what I think is maybe of special value here to every listener is how can I learn about how to maybe handle my conflicts better again, with spouse, with business partner, with our children, with my children’s teachers at school that I’m in disagreement with. Whatever it is, we all need it. Not everybody’s going to necessarily need the mediation services today, and they’ll know that you can do that maybe in a year. But we all can learn from you, I think, today, on what your understanding is of how do I just handle communication better. Right?
[00:25:33] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. So there’s tons of conflict everywhere. Nobody, I think the majority of people run away from conflict when actually if we face our conflict, no matter how hard it is, and we learn how to work through that conflict, it makes us a stronger person. It helps us to.
When another obstacle comes our way, it helps us to better move through that obstacle because we have greater strength now because we’ve already went through it before. Hey, and it didn’t go maybe 100% my way, but, hey, I have the tools now so that when conflict comes up again, whether I’m being bullied at school, I’m a university student, I’m having roommate issues. I’m at the workplace, and. And right now my boss and I are not getting along, and I want to quit my job too. I’m married, and we’re having problems raising Our children because we don’t have the same parenting plan or same parenting background. And now we’re trying to come together to create a new parenting plan. Right. I say parenting plan because that comes from the judicial system as far as, like, divorce. But parenting, right, but parenting plan, right?
[00:26:50] Adam Williams: No, it makes sense to me as a parent.
[00:26:52] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: As a parent, how do you two come together, regardless of what stage you’re in, to parent your kids? Because in that is conflict. Conflict between the spouses, conflict with the children, conflict between the children and everything else. Just like it happens in the workplace in elementary school, you know, everywhere. Conflict is everywhere. So you’re right. How. How do we look at ourselves? How do we learn to move through that conflict? So there’s obstacles to overcome in order to resolve conflict. So the obstacles stem from our emotions. So we all have emotions.
Happy, sad, glad, angry. And then those emotions cause us to feel something, anxiety, how we react to those emotions. So I say in. In regard to anger, it’s okay to be angry, right? You’re being bullied. You’re angry about it, that’s fine. How you react to that anger is what sets you apart to move forward or keep you doing the negative response over and over again.
Miscommunication. So how are we communicating? What do we think when we hear our boss, our teacher, or our parents say, I need to talk to you. How does that make you feel right now? You’re laughing. It’s a nervous laugh, isn’t it?
[00:28:22] Adam Williams: Well, and I think that there was a feeling within my body that recognizes exactly for the reason you’re saying this. There’s a tone there, and I’m like, I’m in trouble, and I’m gonna start getting up my defenses against whatever they’re gonna say I just did.
[00:28:37] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. So that was one tone. Or it could be, I need to speak with you. Can you come to my office? Or can we have a chat? That’s a different tone.
[00:28:45] Adam Williams: There’s more. Maybe an opportunity or something shared there. Positive. Yeah.
[00:28:50] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. So the emotions, what people typically do is they think negative, emotional, off the mark because they’ve had a negative experience in the past with the principal calling them to the office. Right. And they get in trouble. Or, you know, a parent saying, we need to, you know, the dad, I need to speak with you, son. Or. And it’s. We think back to the time that it was a negative experience. And so in order to retrain our brain, it doesn’t always have to be negative. Your boss could be saying, I need to spend time with you can you come to my office today at 3? Yes, sir. Yes, ma’am.
So you go and you’re sweating the whole day. But when you get there, your boss says, I want to give you a raise. I want to commend your work. And then what is all that sweat and tears for? Well, miscommunication. The boss should have said, I have some good news for you. Can you come to my office at 3 today? Well, now you’re excited to see your boss. You’re not dreading it, you’re not sweating it. You’re actually looking forward to the conversation because of the word good news.
[00:29:57] Adam Williams: There’s empathy in that presentation. That empathy says if I say it a certain way, I know this person might feel anxious. If I say it with good news, then I’m setting them up for what my intention really is, which is that this is going to be a positive experience. I don’t want them to spend all day worrying.
[00:30:13] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly.
[00:30:14] Adam Williams: You’re sending so many different stories and memories in my mind and just interactions at home and things. You know, my wife for many years has said that I lawyer when we’re in discussion. I’m like, just because I’m good at making my points, why is this a negative? Like, I hear that as a compliment. You’re saying I’m good at doing this. But of course, what she’s also saying is it’s not always whether you’re right or you’re wrong, it’s how you’re saying it that the tone makes all the difference in the world. And if I feel that as some sort of pressure or tension or attack or something.
So, you know, there’s that cliche, you know, when it comes to marriage and how it’s hard work. My interpretation of that is that it’s because of the conflict resolution efforts, the efforts to get to know ourselves, to do better, to understand our tone and the words we choose right, to have more empathy and compassion for how it is received by the other person. And I think that one of the things that my wife and I are most proud of, if not in life, at least in our marriage, is that we have 20 plus years of this work together. And we can tell how we have built up this more compassionate communication, honesty and truth with each other just to do everything better. And that still is a struggle, especially when you bring in the kids and the parenting and in laws and all the different dynamics.
But communication, to me, is one of the most important things anywhere. That’s work, that’s family. That’s everything.
[00:31:40] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right? And so those are some of the obstacles right that we face? So now we know what the obstacles are. So how do we overcome them? So to answer your question is to understand people from their perspective. Oftentimes we get so positional and our stance is right and you’re wrong. It doesn’t have to be, you’re right, I’m wrong. Why can’t it be both? Or why can’t it just be a personal preference? I like in a marriage relationship, for example, I don’t like dirty dishes left in the sink. This could be a roommate situation for university students. This could be a workplace issue because there’s kitchens in the workplace. So let’s just take this general example and say we don’t like it. Some people don’t like dishes left in the sink for various reasons.
Other people are more laid back, they don’t mind. And then, you know, as long as it gets done by the end of the workday or before we go to bed or what have you, it’s okay. But it causes conflict because we have our own personalities. So try to see it from the other person’s perspective and come to some agreement on, all right, so we each have our ways. It doesn’t mean that you’re right because you wash the dishes one way and I do it the other or what have you. Just that let’s come to an agreement on when we want it done and how we would like to work together, you know, or it could be the kids.
You put the dishes in the dishwasher right after we eat, rather than. You know what I mean? And so all these little things, we think our little things add up over time. So how do we work through them?
Empathy. How does it make us feel when we don’t get our way and we’re positional? What feelings come within us and then how do we express those feelings? Because we’re angry. So it all goes back to understanding ourselves and who we are, because we cannot control how other people will react to us. We can only control our emotions, how we speak, how we make decisions. They can’t make you do that.
[00:33:58] Adam Williams: We are in charge of our own emotions.
[00:33:59] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. We are in charge of our own emotions, which I think a lot of.
[00:34:01] Adam Williams: People don’t feel like it is the case because they say, you, you made me angry, you made me upset, you made me cry. I think a lot of people sort of sidestep their responsibility for their own emotions, their own reactions.
[00:34:13] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly. And I think that’s what’s left lacking is taking responsibility.
[00:34:18] Adam Williams: I heard from somebody, and I wish I could tell you the source, but somebody that is an expert, I think, in communication, this was an online thing, and they said that there are four gates for every instance of communication. So between you and I, there are the words that I say, the things that I think I’m meaning by what I’m saying, the words that you hear and what you think, those mean something to that effect. It’s like we’re having to pass through the way our different brains are taking in this information, processing it, interpreting it. What you hear might be different than what I meant for you to hear might be different than what I think I said.
[00:34:51] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Correct. And so in that point of conflict, when that’s happening, you know, for example, the workplace conflict between a coworker or a worker and her boss or his boss, you know, that’s a power imbalance. And so your boss is communicating to you to do something, and so it’s good, in order to avoid any future conflict, is to say, oh, let me clarify. Let me state back to you what I think I heard you say, so that we’re on the same page and we can move forward. Great. Boom. Let’s go. Right now we’re communicating.
So it’s good to always clarify and present back words in order to have the proper communication and intent behind that communication.
[00:35:42] Adam Williams: Communication is difficult. Like, I’m talking about it being hard work, like the relationships where you actually put in that effort. But we don’t do that with everybody beyond our partner, our spouse, or whoever we’re in our closest relationships with. That’s who we think it’s worth putting in so much energy and effort to keep working at it. So I think that when we get into these. These things with other people, it can be very difficult to have the patience. Right? What boss is going to have patience with me to have to figure out, “well, let’s see, Adam needs to hear it in this way? I have to handle him in this way. But somebody else down the hall or at a different desk I can talk to in this way.” And that’s, that’s how they understand it. It gets difficult to go through all the hoops to have really great communication.
[00:36:31] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Absolutely. But as a good boss, part of being a good leader is to know the strengths and weaknesses of your teammates. Right? So, yeah, I do need to speak to Joe in this manner because he will respond to it better. Just akin to how you parent your children when. When a parent has to discipline children and they know which child will respond to what discipline and which discipline will work better, is that not correct?
[00:37:06] Adam Williams: Well, and which parent is. Is giving that, you know, which one is talking, you know, at different dynamics in the house. One son, I have two sons, one son is going to respond to me in one way and differently to his mother and vice versa across all these different connections in the house.
[00:37:22] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Yes, absolutely. Communication is really one of the ways that I think as people, in order to push through conflict or understanding how to communicate and the different ways we communicate is very important.
With that being said, in order to help resolve conflict, we also need to not just try to resolve it around the surface issues, but oftentimes it’s underlying issues that are the root cause of the problem. And if we don’t get to what the root issue is, then we will never be able to overcome what it is that keeps that issue coming back around.
For example, in the workplace, a person who is an employee that continually has to be told what to do or continues to make problems in the workplace or doesn’t do their work. And so. So they get written up and then what is the root cause of that? Why are they not responding?
Their boss, they’re actually in authority over that worker because that worker is employed by them. Right? So what is it that they can’t work under that authority and maybe just follow through with what their boss wants them to do?
[00:38:59] Adam Williams: So trying to find out what that is with that employee to get a better understanding of who they are as a person, maybe what they need, how they need to hear things.
[00:39:06] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Yes. So it’s on both parties’ part to be introspective, to say, why do I keep getting written up as an employee? I’m a nice person, I try to do my job to the best of my ability. And the employer is thinking, how can I help this person not make these mistakes again? What are their strengths? What are their weaknesses? How can we move through this together so that we can both accomplish the task and I don’t have to fire this person or I don’t have to put them on a pip. Does that make sense?
[00:39:42] Adam Williams: It costs more to have to hire somebody else to be without this worker, you know, have a gap in the staff for a while. Like it’s. It’s worth the effort to be an empowering leader who has these conversations rather than the command and control boss who just stops at, I told you what to do, you didn’t do it, you’re out.
[00:40:03] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Yes. And that’s empathy, right? That’s empathy. And that’s what we need to help move through conflict.
[00:40:11] Adam Williams: I think for empathy, people have to do the Work within themselves, to know themselves, to then do a better job of understanding the humanness that is within the other person, whoever this other person is in their life, every other person they interact with in their lives.
[00:40:24] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right.
[00:40:24] Adam Williams: But so many of us either have not gotten to that place with ourselves. We’re not aware that we need to get to any particular place of understanding. How do I take what has happened in the past in my life and grow from that rather than maybe hide it as an issue of shame? So many people are blocking it off and they’re. Well, if we go back to Carl Jung, I think he was the one who talked about the shadow. There’s the shadow self. That’s where we’re trying to hide everything in the dark and not deal with it. And that’s where we end up acting out from when we don’t have empathy for ourselves, like we don’t understand ourselves and have compassion for ourselves, love ourselves, and then we cannot end up rippling that out to everybody else we interact with.
[00:41:03] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. And so do you think that in that. Who is the type of person that wants to be introspective and wants to put forth that effort to make their relationship better, whatever that relationship is with the spouse, their children, their boss, it takes a lot of work.
[00:41:24] Adam Williams: It does.
[00:41:25] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: And life in general is hard. However, I feel, and I believe if we are better in tune to how we respond, what our emotions, how we react, how we have empathy, hear what the other person is saying, well, doesn’t that make a big difference? Because at the end of the day, I’m understanding you better, which helps you understand me better and why we do things the way we do.
[00:41:59] Adam Williams: We talked about people not wanting to be wrong. You know, they’re arguing to not be wrong. And along the way that kind of is also then saying, you, the other person must be wrong. Somebody here has to be right. Somebody has to be wrong. And I’m sure not going to be the one that’s going to go down claiming to be wrong.
If I apologize for some people, that’s considered a weakness, especially maybe from a man. Whereas I see that as a strength because that is rooted in my having done some self reflection, some introspection, and dealing with ego issues and saying it’s okay, and not only okay, but it’s good for me to be able to say, I can accept this hit to my ego. I can acknowledge to you that I am trustworthy because I’m going to admit I’m wrong. And you have validity in what you’re saying, right?
[00:42:48] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: So I think what is the greater good in that? Is the greater good for me to be obstinate because there’s a power imbalance and I’m the boss and you should do what I say versus having empathy so you can keep your worker and keep them happy.
[00:43:08] Adam Williams: It’s short term versus long term.
[00:43:10] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly, exactly. So just like a marriage, is anyone’s vision when they get married to get a divorce in two, five, ten years? No. Nobody goes into marriage thinking that they’re going to get a divorce.
[00:43:27] Adam Williams: Right?
[00:43:28] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. Yeah, most people. And I think it’s probably truer when you’re younger, starting out in a company and being kind of green and glassy eyed with your first job and then having that reality that your boss is happy with you and how do you move through that? Right. What’s, where are you going to be in five years? Nobody goes into a job wanting to quit it, I mean, or expecting to have problems. Right. I mean, when you’re starting out and younger, as you get older, yes, there’s conflicts. But again, if you, if people are able to learn how to deal with conflict and communicate and express their feelings and to give up some of that power for the greater good of oh, maybe you’re gonna get promoted in this job and become the CEO and now you have, you know, retirement benefits, et cetera. Right. So what is the greater good? By the actions we do in the.
[00:44:36] Adam Williams: Moment, how we treat each other is if it’s done, comparison compassionately is always going to set us up for a longer term, better chance of success. Whatever the kind of relationship.
One question that I was taught that has been really huge for me is when you are in a discussion, argument, whatever with someone is to say how is what they are saying is true? How is it true? Because so often we immediately become defensive and we put up that barrier and we want to deny and defy whatever it is they’re saying. You’re saying I’m being a bad employee. You’re saying I’m being a bad husband, a bad father, that can’t be true. That’s not how I see myself. I’m not going to accept that. That’s my ego in the way.
But if I can soften up my rigid wall there a bit and say, well, maybe what part of what they’re saying is true? And I start to accept some of what they’re saying because how often is it black or white? Either or it’s going to be in the gray somewhere. What you have to say to me about me, there’s Got to be some truth in that. And again, trust, there’s validity in what you’re saying. And if I can accept that and we have that trust back and forth now, we can live together successfully in the gray area for a longer term relationship of whatever nature.
[00:45:51] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly. And so we were talking about taking responsibility earlier.
[00:45:55] Adam Williams: I love responsibility. I wish more people would take it.
[00:45:57] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly. And so part of owning that is, is communicating from I statements. Oftentimes in conflict, what happens is people tend to blame, as you mentioned earlier, well, you did this, which is why I did that.
[00:46:12] Adam Williams: Right.
[00:46:13] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Well, if we speak from my statements, I feel this way because I think this way, I reacted this way because instead of sticking to the facts rather than feelings, then it helps us to take on the responsibility for our actions. And then in that is building trust. Because now the other person is seeing that you’re taking responsibility, that you’re owning up for things that maybe you did wrong. And now they’re going to reciprocate most often because you’ve given up something, they’re going to give up something. It’s just nature, it’s natural.
[00:46:54] Adam Williams: We’ve got to want to have the relationship work.
[00:46:56] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly.
[00:46:58] Adam Williams: You brought something to my mind in that when we’re looking to blame the other person or explain away, justify what we did. Well, you did this. That’s why I did this, therefore I was justified in doing it. Is the term whataboutism. So often people will say, well, what about this? What about when you did this thing to me, therefore I’m good, I can do the wrong thing too. I go through these things all the time with my kids. Right. Because they never want to focus on their own responsibility. It’s always about, well, what he did. And that justifies, you’re going to be wrong too. That’s our way forward.
Somebody’s got to be willing to step up and take responsibility and be willing to take the hit to themselves and say, okay, I’m sorry for this. How can we move forward?
[00:47:44] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Exactly. And why do we fear it? Why, why do we have a fear of conflict? Why is it that, you know, it’s so hard to talk about our feelings and our emotions and to move past them to get to a better place? It’s fascinating.
[00:48:04] Adam Williams: There’s a lot of work we all need to be doing individually and together with a little bit of time that we have left. I want to ask about your international travel as a mediator, conflict resolution expert in whatever capacities you have, because I find that to be fascinating that you have gone to other Countries. And I’m not really sure in what ways you have used these skills. Can I hear a little bit about that before we wrap up?
[00:48:29] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Sure. So going back to the children’s home that I lived in, I graduated and went to college. And when I was in college, no, then I moved to grad school. Well, in that time, that children’s home became international.
So they started an international adoption agency through Russia, Romania, these places, of course, this was prior to Russia closing their doors to Americans adopting their children.
[00:48:57] Adam Williams: Okay.
[00:48:58] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: And so I would go over with them and facilitate conversations about why it’s important to get back to your community, meaning your youth, because they’re the future generation. So the children’s home asked me to go with them, so that. Because I was their example. Right. And so that started me on the trek of learning cultural issues, learning how to facilitate conversations in a different culture. Right? So oftentimes, other cultures think Americans know it all.
[00:49:41] Adam Williams: Well, a lot of Americans act like we do.
[00:49:43] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Right. Like we do. And so learning that balance that. I’m not here to tell you what to do. I’m here to say, because my community invested in my life, I became successful. It wasn’t because I was perfect. It wasn’t because I never made a mistake. There was always support around me in some fashion, whether it was our neighbors bringing us Easter baskets so we would have something at Easter, people taking care of us as foster parents to the children’s home, getting tutoring lessons, and having me compete in, you know, taekwondo. And, you know, like, all of those little things add up, because all of those things build your confidence and as a child, help you believe that people love you and care about you. Right?
And then they’re giving you tools in many different ways. They’re giving you tools to become a better person, a better citizen. And as you grow up and you get an education, whether it’s formal or not, why is it helpful then now, whichever country you live in, why is it now beneficial? Why do you think it’s beneficial to invest in your youth? So that’s kind of how my story started out, and that’s how it evolved into facilitating meetings from city hall to educational institutions, then becoming a mediator and starting my own business.
[00:51:25] Adam Williams: I think it’s incredible that you became an ambassador effectively for this experience that you had and for those who showed you that love and structure and the things that you needed. Again, it was an opportunity, sort of launch platform for you to then go through and help others who might be having their own version of this experience, whether that’s as a child, but also then of course as adults. And all these different mediation forms where we all still need help. How do we resolve our conflicts?
Thank you so much for everything you’ve shared, Tracy. I wish we could keep talking because I know there’s so much more we could get into, but I want to send people in the show notes to your website. They can learn more about what you do professionally there. So I will include that on our website for the podcast. Thank you very much, Tracy.
[00:52:10] Tracy Arthur Kachadourian: Thank you, Adam. I enjoyed it.
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[00:52:19] Adam Williams: Thank you for listening to the We Are Chaffee Podcast. You can learn more about this episode and others in the show notes at wearechaffeepod.com and on Instagram @wearechaffeepod.
I invite you to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I also welcome your telling others about the We Are Chaffee Podcast. Help us to keep growing community and connection through conversation. The We Are Chaffee Podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health.
Thank you to Andrea Carlstrom, Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment, and to Lisa Martin, Community Advocacy Coordinator for the larger We Are Chaffee Storytelling initiative. Once again, I’m Adam Williams Williams, host, producer and photographer for the We Are Chaffee Podcast.
If you have comments, or if you know someone in Chaffee County, Colorado who I should consider talking with on the show, you can email me at adam @ wearechaffeepod.com.
Til the next episode. As we say it, We Are Chaffee, “share stories, make change.”
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